


Devotion

by Cheloya



Series: Dissonance [2]
Category: Pet Shop of Horrors
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-20
Updated: 2017-05-20
Packaged: 2018-10-27 06:46:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,041
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10803930
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cheloya/pseuds/Cheloya
Summary: Old, imported. Sofu D does not have high hopes for this grandchild.





	Devotion

There is a moment of silence in the pet shop as every occupant holds its breath. Then, cacophony. The animals cringe away from the lusty wail of a baby, and the customer – a round-faced woman who, only seconds ago, had been berating Count D on some matter of pet care – claps her hands over her mouth.  
  
"Oh, I'm so sorry," she whispers through her ring-encrusted fingers, and Count D waves an elegant dismissal with one hand as he crosses the room. It is richly decorated, filled with antique furniture and priceless artefacts. The cradle does not look out of place, draped as it is in coloured silks, shielded from the rest of the room by a screen decorated with painted goldfish.  
  
The cradle does not look out of place, but the baby does – creamy skin flushed with infant rage, golden curls dampened with sleep-sweat and tears. As Count D lifts the child close and bends his head to murmur soothingly against the baby’s brow, its wails become sobs, and finally turn to deep, shuddering breaths. Its eyes blink open grudgingly. Tiny fist against its mouth, it rests the side of its face against the Count’s shoulder and stares at the customer as though it has never seen a woman before. Its eyes are as large and as blue as her own small son’s most prized glass marble.  
  
“Oh, isn’t he adorable,” she coos, immediately charmed. “Is he yours?”  
  
The Count smiles his pleasant vacant smile and for a moment the twist of his lips is a wry one. “In a manner of speaking,” he says, golden eyes impossible to read. “I am caring for him in his mother’s absence.”  
  
“Oh, dear.” The woman ventures close enough to wiggle her fingers at the child; they both giggle delightedly. “Well, if you ever need a helping hand with this little man, you just give me a call,” she croons, more to the child than to the Count. “I’m sure he’d have a ball with little Joshua.”  
  
Count D smiles and shifts the child toward a hip he barely has. “Of course, Mrs Gardiner,” he demurs. “But it will be some time before he is old enough to be trusted with other children. Sharing is so difficult when they are young.” And with another brilliant, blank smile, he makes an encouraging motion with his free hand.  
  
“Now... you were saying?”  
  
-  
  
It will be a long time before the child is fit to leave the pet shop, but not precisely for the reason he had quoted to Mrs Gardiner. Learning to share should actually come very easily to the child; it is, D suspects, what it has been doing from the day it first drew breath.  
  
When he had left Los Angeles, he had been able to feel the lingering presence of his son within the human baby. It had given him hope that somewhere within the flesh there lay a remnant of the son he had adored, for all his flaws, for all his wrong decisions. He need only be patient, and his son would once again reveal himself to D.  
  
But as he flew, he felt the presence fading, and by the time he reached a new city, his son’s spirit had been buried so deeply within the human flesh that he wondered for a moment if he had allowed his emotions to take hold of his reason – if the familiarity he had felt was merely a reflection of the same foolish hope that had driven his son, his grandson.  
  
For a long moment, Count D wanted nothing more than to reach into the soft, mortal flesh with both his hands. Surely if he only dug deep enough he could find some remnant of his son, and restore him to the way he should have been. But his son had never been the way he should have been, and for a few terrible moments, looking down at the child’s mind that had stolen his son, Count D suspected he might, at last, understand why.  
  
He had never needed to name a child before. They were, and always had been, D. But this child is not a D; this child is human. And so, Count D – who can respect his child’s decisions, even if he cannot understand them – had named the human child ‘Vesca’.  
  
-  
  
Later, Count D wonders if that naming had been even more significant than it seemed at the time, for no matter what he does, his native tongue only perplexes the boy, though he does well enough with English.  
  
Sometimes he says words that D knows he has not been taught, and D suspects he is remembering, rather than learning the language anew.  
  
Despite a nagging irritation at the child, there are certain things that Count D hopes the child will not remember, just as there are certain memories that he wishes were never given to his beloved grandchild.  
  
Learning to speak having long preceded learning to write, Vesca has a more than adequate vocabulary when it comes to the spoken word. He knows the names and breeds of all the pets in the store – at least, all the pets he is permitted to visit – and he is not shy about demanding to be shown how to write them all. It is disheartening to Count D that these names – names from a thousand countries, a thousand cultures – must all be rendered carefully in English.  
  
It is nevertheless a relief to him when Vesca comes to him one evening with a children’s book and an expression of great puzzlement.  
  
“It’s all wrong,” he says. His blue eyes are concerned. “It says this is a cat, but our cats don’t look like that at all.”  
  
Count D smiles at him, possibly the first real smile he has ever bestowed upon the child in his five short years of life, and Vesca looks surprised for half a second before his face brightens and he glows up at his grandfather.  
  
“That is because it is a human story,” he replies. He sets the book aside and pats the space beside him on the sofa. “Come,” he continues, as Vesca scrambles eagerly into place. “It is time for a different story. The oldest our family has.”


End file.
